Friday, November 23, 2012

Our time in Tonga was punctuated with joy and sorrow. We met
for the first time the beautiful people of the Kingdom of Tonga and were
exposed to a new culture in a developing nation. We had more time to explore a
country than we usually do before rushing off to the next one, because we had a
month to wait until the weather was good enough for the passage to New Zealand.
We caught up with the rest of the American fleet, which had preceded us all the
way across the South Pacific, and met crews we hadn’t seen since La Paz,
Mexico. We reunited with old friends and made some new ones. But the cloud
shadow of a family tragedy darkened what would have been an otherwise sunny
time and made me anxious to leave for New Zealand, where we would leave the
boat in Patrick’s care for the beginning of cyclone season and I would catch a
flight home. We waited patiently for a weather window in which to make the
passage. After a month in Tonga, it was time to say our farewells.We planned to head south to the Ha’apai Group to position
ourselves further along the route and to take advantage of the next opportunity
(after a passing low) to set course for New Zealand. As we left the Vava’u
Group, a humpback whale breached twice in front of the boat! During our month
in Tonga, we had seen half a dozen humpbacks, but they were always underway and
not putting on a display. We didn’t have our cameras at the ready for the
breaching humpback, but took some pictures of its later show of tail slapping behavior. The humpback was Vava’u’s farewell gift to us.

Due to the high winds accompanying the tropical depression,
we spent our time in the Ha’apai weather bound and confined to the boat. We
were unable to explore the active volcano at Tofua Island or snorkel in the
area.

We photographed Tofua on our way out of Tonga

After the cyclone passed, a weather window opened up for the passage to
New Zealand; so we spent a day in the village running errands and left on
passage the next day. Riding in the dinghy at sunrise on the morning we pulled
anchor, headed for a last trip to the Saturday market, I was overwhelmed by the
smell of frangipani and became acutely aware that we were leaving the tropics. By
the time we returned to the boat, the frequently encountered smell of burning
palm fronds---another smell I associate with the tropics---had replaced the
fragrant scent of frangipani. Shortly after clearing the harbor, we passed a
huge sea turtle swimming along in the opposite direction of Silhouette.

The passage continued in this vein, with the sea presenting
its remembrances like
the breaching whale and the sea turtle. It was as if the sea was aware that this
was our last passage for many months and was trying to pack all its gifts and
glory into one voyage. Dolphin graced our bow for the first time since the
Marquesas, and a school of fish ran with the boat under our hull. Flying fish
made flights of epic length by day, and meteors arced through the skies by
night. The rainbows were all double-rainbows. Silhouette scattered bioluminescent organisms from her bow wave
like sparks from a blacksmith’s forge.

The second rainbow is faint in this picture

Yet the sea, always one to play her cards close to the
chest, also continued to offer up new mysteries. We began to travel through fields
of pumice, leftover extrusions from a volcanic eruption.

A light pumice field passed early on

Tonga, in particular, is very tectonically active, as it is located along plate
boundaries. (We had earlier experienced a 5.5
magnitude earthquake, whose epicenter was only 28 miles away, while moored at Lape Island. Usually, you can’t
feel an earthquake while at sea; but since we were attached to the bottom
through the ground tackle of the mooring, I could clearly feel the earthquake
that morning.) Along with earthquakes, Tonga is subject to frequent volcanic
activity, and reports of new volcanic islands being created and then eroding back
into the sea almost as quickly through wave action are not uncommon. The pumice
we were seeing now was most likely from a recent undersea eruption http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/view.php?id=78849. It occurred in vast patches
from latitude 19 degrees to latitude 33 degrees and varied in size from coarse,
cat litter-sized particles to chunks the size of small boulders.

Patrick and I collected some fist-sized pieces of pumice as
it passed by the boat. Each miniature floating island was a microcosm! We
discovered gooseneck barnacles, tube worms, and diminutive crabs inhabiting their
barren volcanic tracts. Tenacious life was everywhere! When I think of the
journey those pumice stones took---thrust out of the magma chamber of a volcano
in a violent explosion, cooling immediately upon contact with the seawater,
drifting wherever the ocean currents carried them, and finally being colonized by
minute planktonic larvae, some of which survived to adulthood---I am stupefied.
And as for the sea life: how did these tiny creatures, alive and well on a floating piece of pumice no
bigger than my hand, survive the tropical depression that inflicted injury upon
so many vessels of larger dimensions?

Pumice island

Detail of pumice crab

As the degrees of latitude ticked off, we became aware of
how startingly cool the water felt when we trailed our hands over the side or
ran the seawater pump---just as, months ago, we were amazed by the warmth of
the tropical sea after the hypothermia-inducing waters of the Pacific
Northwest. Nights in the cockpit began to see us wearing more layers, gradually
bringing out the fleece, lightweight rain gear, and finally, full foul weather
gear, hats, and gloves. I still wore shorts during the day up until the last three
days of the passage (which were overcast, windy, and damp), but I traded tank
tops for T-shirts and was no longer continually bathed in sweat. It was a
relief to be cool again. The sunny, yet brisk days on passage reminded me of
summer in Puget Sound.

Reaching under sunny skies

Since our Pactor modem is defunct and we couldn’t get
weather reports in the format we like most, we spent a lot more time on this
passage listening to the radio than we usually do. Another reason for more time
spent on frequency was because we were in proximity to many boats making the
same passage at the same time, another first for us. We tuned into Gulf Harbor
Radio out of New Zealand, hosted by David and Patricia from S/V Chameleon, for the passage weather report each morning. (David
is a meteorologist.) We reported our position in the late afternoon on the
Pacific Seafarer’s Net. We tuned in to the Drifter’s Net in the morning and
evening to monitor the positions of other boats around us and to find out what
the weather was like up ahead.

News of other crews experiencing their own cloud shadows
reached us both before departing Neiafu and during the journey. When we arrived
in Neiafu, we were puzzled as to why our friends Jim and Karen’s boat, Sockdolager,
was on a mooring buoy in the harbor, while they were nowhere to be seen. We
later learned that Karen had been experiencing heart palpitations and, after a
nightmarish evaluation in a hospital in Nuku’Alofa, flew to New Zealand for
further tests and treatment. Jim accompanied her but later returned to Neiafu
to retrieve Sockdolager. He will
bring the boat to New Zealand with a close friend accompanying him as crew.
Karen and Jim have published their story on their ownblog.

I have intentionally omitted the boat and crew names from most
of the other incidents recounted here in order to protect peoples’ privacy. One
skipper’s mother passed away, and he had to fly home to New Zealand for the
funeral, leaving his wife and daughter with the boat in Neiafu. He flew back to
Tonga after the funeral, only to turn towards New Zealand a second time, this
time under sail. On another vessel, the skipper suffered a heart attack.
Poignantly, he died at sea just before reaching his intended destination of
Auckland.

When we were about halfway to New Zealand, we heard the
report of another casualty on a boat that had run aground on a reef back in the
Vava’u Group. The body was badly decomposed, and authorities found 200 kg of cocaine with an Australian street value of $116 million onboard.

Some loads were lightened by aid from other cruisers. When
the co-captain from one boat broke his leg and had to be flown out
of the country for treatment, another cruising couple sent their son down to
fill in as an additional crew member while the injured man’s wife (and her
father) took the boat on to New Zealand. When a boat’s exhaust muffler
developed a hole en route to New Zealand
(due to hot gases caused by a failed cooling water pump), and the crew decided to
turn back to Nuku’Alofa because they were taking on water through the hole, the
fleet pulled together to help them. They were encouraged to continue on to
nearby Minerva Reef, where ten to twelve boats lay at anchor. The crews from
several boats pitched in to remove the boat’s muffler and fiberglass the hole
so that the original crew could carry on. Finally, when the damper plate on
another boat’s engine broke---preventing them from being able to use their
motor and potentially leaving them stuck in the doldrums for several days---another
boat gave them a tow to where there was wind .The two boats traveled in tandem for a
couple of days, separating when there was wind in order to sail, and resuming
towing and being towed when there was not. (In this case, the crew on the boat
being towed had already booked a flight out of New Zealand that they were
trying to catch. They also had young children on board and could not afford to
drift for a couple of days and then get caught in the next low pressure system.)

There were some other silver linings. Adventure Bound, the vessel that responded to the aid of the crew in distress,finally made it
safely to Opua and received a hero’s welcome from the members of the boating
community assembled there. The crew of Moonwalker
sailed into the Bay of Islands and their home country for the first time in
six years after completing a circumnavigation.

Patrick and I heard most of these stories over the radio as
we were on our way to New Zealand. On this passage that is notorious for having too much wind, our problem---as well as that of the other boats traveling at the same time---was that there was too little. Patrick and I chose to do whatever it took to keep the boat moving, so that we could arrive in New Zealand before the next predicted low. Based on our accumulated engine hours, we motored or motor sailed a total of four days out of an eleven day passage.

Our passage remained without incident
until the day before we arrived in the Bay of Islands. The weather had turned
cloudy and rainy, and the wind and sea conditions had picked up.

Happy skipper

Wave after passing under the boat

During the
last 36 hours of our trip, we had sustained winds of over twenty knots a good
portion of the time and 3-4 meter seas. The wind during our last few days
on passage had been from a favorable northeast direction, and at one point, we
went from a double-reefed main and staysail down to just the staysail because
the boat was going so fast. During the afternoon, the
wind had clocked around to the southeast, so that we were beating to weather on
our course to New Zealand in winds over twenty knots. We forewent our usual
watch schedule on our last night at sea, each taking only a brief nap, so that
we could both be on deck for sail changes and boat handling. Our forward
progress became so slow, and the boat was
pounding into the seas so jarringly, that in lieu of stopping and
heaving to, we decided to motor sail in order to keep going.

We started the engine and continued ahead. Suddenly, the
engine died. We figured that the fuel pick-up line might have gotten clogged
again (which turned out to be the problem the last two times the engine stalled),
and Patrick switched to the other fuel tank. The engine started temporarily, and
then died again. I took the helm, while Patrick started troubleshooting the
engine problem. With the erratic motion of the boat and the rolling sea, he
thought that air may have gotten into the pick-up line, causing the engine to stall, so he began to bleed the
engine. The bleeding screw from the top of the fuel injector pump broke off
when Patrick (hanging upside down over the engine in a rolling three meter sea)
tried to loosen it with a long wrench. Now there was no way we could run the
engine without squirting diesel all over, so we realized that we were going to
have to complete our voyage without an engine.

With the wind we were having, it was not going to be a
problem getting to New Zealand, but we were concerned about navigating the
channel into Opua in the dark without an engine. As it turned out, we didn’t
arrive until dawn due to our slow progress beating south.

Landfall in Aotearoa

A safe harbor awaits

The Bay of Islands

Silhouette enters the Bay of Islands

As we entered the Bay
of Islands, the wind dropped to seven knots or less, and we despaired of losing
it entirely and being stalled so close to our goal. Soon it rose back to 12-14
knots and we were making our way down the channel. Once we arrived at the
narrowest part of the channel, the wind dropped again. We were hailed over the
radio by Tevakenui, who was entering
the bay behind us, and generously offered a tow. We wanted to continue under
our own power and gratefully declined. By now, the wind had dropped again, and
we completed our passage ghosting along under the main and staysail. Patrick
steered, while I operated the sheets and traveler as we short-tacked down the
narrow channel toward the “Q” (quarantine) dock.

Patrick had been concerned about how he was going to bring Silhouette alongside the dock without an
engine (we don’t have a steering oar onboard), but earlier that morning, David
from Gulf Harbor Radio gave us a suggestion. He suggested it was possible to
call Customs and ask permission to drop anchor near the Q dock instead of
docking, and that they would send a dinghy out to clear the boat. This turned
out to be what happened, and it saved us a lot of stress and worry. We weaved
our way in and out of the boats at anchor until we were able to come alongside
the Q dock, then dropped our anchor while under sail. From the dock, we heard a
small burst of applause, and looked over to see the crews of Kindred Spirit and Tevakenui. Both vessels had entered the Bay of Islands after us,
but both boats reached the Customs dock before us. It was wonderful to receive
this warm welcome after the last tiring 36 hours. It had taken as long to
travel the last 25 miles to the Bay of Islands and to tack into it as it did
to sail the preceding 75 miles before that!

But we weren’t done yet. The Customs and Biosecurity clearances
were quick and painless (except for giving up some beautiful fresh tomatoes,
which the rough weather had prevented me from turning into spaghetti sauce),
but then we had to sail off the anchor. We couldn’t remain where we were, in
the channel used by boats coming alongside the Q dock, and had to find a spot
in the anchorage. We had planned to stay in the marina for our first week in
Opua, but the broken engine precluded that. We sailed off the anchor without
incident and soon set the hook in the mud of one of the many yacht mooring
areas in the Bay of Islands. We saw some familiar vessels as well as many new
boats at anchor: New Zealand is truly a
boater’s paradise.

The gray mist, dripping rain, and cold temperature made us
feel right at home. Entering the temperate zone climate of New Zealand was like
coming back to the Pacific Northwest.

The breakwater at Opua with the Q-dock; Opua Marina is behind the breakwater

Silhouette at anchor in the Bay of Islands: The green, nutrient-filled water shows that we're not in the tropics anymore and are in an urban environment.

We have been away from Seattle for thirteen months, and
between April and November 2012, we completed our first cruising season. Since
we belatedly reset the boat odometer in Newport, Oregon (forgetting to do it
before we left Seattle), we have put 11,624 miles under the keel. Now, it’s
time for a little rest while Silhouette contemplates
her next move. Do we have a project list in store for her? Of course we do.

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Now that we have safely arrived in New Zealand, I can make
the following post about the tropical disturbance experienced in the Fiji-Tonga
region on November 6-8 without worrying my family.

November 9, 2012: Pangai, Lifuka Island, Tonga

Map courtesy of www.lonelyplanet.com

We are here in the Ha’apai Group of Tonga, preparing to head
southwest to New Zealand. Our first tropical depression has just passed over us
and is moving away to the southeast. Although it was a cyclonic (rotating)
storm, the winds did not reach cyclone intensity and the storm was not named.

The Ha’apai Group has little protection from westerly winds,
so different strategies were employed by different vessels to avoid the
storm---which would eventually expose us to westerlies. A few boats turned
around and traveled the 70 miles back to the protection of the safe harbor in
Neiafu. (Some vessels as far south as Tongatapu did the same, and some boats
that had already left for New Zealand turned around and went back to Tongatapu
for shelter.) Four boats here in the Ha’apai managed to squeeze into the small
boat harbor at Pangai by Med (Mediterranean) mooring (tying stern-to the shore
and dropping an anchor forward.) One of these boats had to shorten its anchor
chain after dragging, when its steering vane rudder banged into the rock wall
at its stern, and all the boats in the harbor maintained anchor watches through the night as the crowded harbor allowed no room for error. Another vessel, arriving at Ha’apai late in the day, set their
anchor in the anchorage outside the harbor. This boat had the least protection
and the most difficulty. Their anchor dragged; they set a second anchor; their
snubber broke and finally, their second anchor dragged. They ended up turning
on their motor and motoring forward to take the strain off the anchor chain. They
managed to hold position this way until the worst of the wind backed off. Then,
they moved into the inner harbor with the other four boats.

These pictures were taken in the calm the morning after the storm had passed:

Oyaragh, Saltbreaker, Taima, and Ardea - Med moored at Pangai

Off Tempo finally found a safe berth

Because we felt that the harbor was too crowded and would be unsafe, Patrick and I traveled six miles south in Silhouette and anchored in the
protection of a sand cay off Tatafa Island (http://goo.gl/maps/AUGJS). There, we received the full force
of the wind but were protected from the waves in three directions (including
the west) by the cay and by the islands and reef to the east. The bottom was sand
and grass with excellent holding and we only set a single anchor, which---in
retrospect---was probably a mistake. We knew the winds were going to clock
around, and we were trying to avoid having two anchor chains crossing over each
other and getting tangled. In the end, our anchor held, but the maximum wind
gust we saw was only 35 knots. If we had gotten the 50+ knot winds received
elsewhere, it might have been a different story. (Skipper's Note: We did, however, have a second large anchor at the ready and could have deployed it in moments if required.) Our lowest barometer reading
was 999 hPa (hecto-Pascals), which indicates that we were in the center (eye)
of the low and not in the direct path of the strongest winds. However, we did
receive sustained 30 knot winds for hours on end on November 8.

Silhouette behind the sand cay in 30 knot winds

North of us, back in Neiafu, boats at anchor reported wind
speeds of 40 knots accompanied by lightening. At the sand cay off Tatafa
Island, the sky was constantly illuminated by lightening during the night of
November 7, but we received no bolts and only distant thunder.

Overall, those of us at anchor near land fared better than
those at sea. Depending on where they were in relation to the path of the
cyclone, different boats experienced different conditions from three to four
meter seas in 25-30 knot winds to five to ten meter seas in 40-50 knot winds.
Gusts in the 70 knot range were reported both at sea and further south in
Tongatapu.

Many boats at sea en route to New Zealand sustained damage.
One boat lost its forestay. On another vessel, ports broke and had to be
boarded up in order to avoid the intrusion of sea water into the cabin. We heard several boats report that they blew
out their stays’ls (the sail often employed during rough weather), including
one that also lost their propane tank and their ability to prepare warm food.
Another boat’s autopilot broke down. But the worse situation encountered by any
crew was when the boat Windigo rolled.

The first report we heard stated that the crew of two (whom
we had chatted with several times in Neiafu) had boarded their life raft. Fortunately,
this turned out not to be true, and the report was later amended to say that
the crew had stayed onboard their vessel but had sustained injuries. We heard
over the radio that at least one person on board had a concussion. The nearest
vessel to them in the fleet, Adventure
Bound (a more sturdily built vessel than Windigo) turned around and started bashing back to weather in horrendous
conditions in order to assist the disabled crew. A New Zealand Navy ship and a commercial vessel were diverted
to the scene to attempt a rescue. During this time Adventure
Bound was asked to stand by until they arrived. New Zealand aircraft were also
on the scene monitoring the situation and providing updated position reports throughout the ordeal. Windigo was too far offshore for a helicopter to reach and effect a rescue. After arriving at Windigo’s position,
Adventure Bound reported observing a
total of six aircraft flying over. Obviously, no resources were spared in
coming to the aid of the injured crew.

Thankfully, both Windigo
and Adventure Bound crews
survived the ordeal. Windigo’s crew
was rescued and transported to New Zealand for medical care.Windigo was not
scuttled---perhaps its crew will be able to salvage it at some point---and
became a navigational hazard for the rest of the southbound fleet. The position
of the drifting hull was widely reported over the radio. The assisting vessel, Adventure Bound, sustained damage of
their own when they came to the rescue:
Their wind vane steering mechanism broke and they lost their wind
generator. When the rescue was complete and the Windigo crew was receiving medical attention, the Adventure Bound crew wisely hove to and
rested up before contemplating their next move. After over 36 hours partly
spent traveling to the scene, engaging in endless radio communications with all
parties involved, and standing by at the scene should he and his shipmate need to
attempt the rescue themselves, the exhaustion was evident in the voice of Adventure Bound skipper, Bruce. Bruce
joked over the radio that he was going to change the name of his vessel to a
more delicate-sounding name like Ladybug*
so he wouldn’t be called upon in this manner again. Another skipper on
frequency suggested instead the well-earned epigram of Homeward Bound. Truly a job well done, Adventure Bound!

It was very heart-warming to follow the drama at sea from a
distance as the cruising fleet pulled together---with the help of Gulf Harbour
Radio and other Ham operators---to support the vessels that had the misfortune
to be underway during the tropical depression.

(*No offense to the actual Ladybug, whose skipper is himself an
extremely skillful sailor.)

Friday, November 2, 2012

I've attended two church services while in Tonga. Although I am
not a regular church goer at home, I wanted to attend a Tongan service to
hear the legendary singing of the choir. I had also received some bad news from
home, and I thought church not a bad space to send some loving thoughts out
towards my family. I do not consider this behavior hypocritical because in my
view, if there is a god, he/she/it would welcome anyone into his/her/its house
at any time. In fact, one of the things that alienated me from the Catholic church
(the religion I was brought up with) was the image of a wrathful god metering
out judgment and the polarized world view that image engendered. People are either
good or bad, saints or sinners; and when you die, you go to heaven, hell, or
purgatory. As an adult, I have learned that I don’t believe in any of those
things. While most villages house a large Catholic church, we attended the
“local” Tongan church, a Wesleyan branch.

While visiting the village of Falevai near Port Maurelle on
a Saturday, a local woman invited us to church on Sunday. We did return to the
village for church the next day. We had made prints of the pictures we took of
the Tongan woman and her children and brought them along with us to give to
her. As we have seen elsewhere, although the village was small, it had multiple
churches. As we arrived for our service at the Wesleyan church, which started
at 10:00 a.m., we could hear the singing from at least one other church that
was already in session. There are really no words that can describe the Tongan
singing in a church service. While the villagers may be materially poor, the
richness of their spirit radiates through their singing. Tongan church singing
is the definition of rejoicing.

Church in Tonga is a formal event. Everyone comes dressed in
their Sunday best, which, for the men and women include the pandanus waist
mat---called a ta’ovala---worn as a
sign of respect in Tonga. In Neiafu, despite the heat, men wore button down
shirts and suit coats over tupenu, men’s
wraparound skirts which are worn past the knee, and ta’ovalo; and women were
dressed in long skirts, blouses, and ta’ovalo. Many women fanned themselves
with pandanus fans during the service. Black seemed to be the dominant color
among the formal dress of men and women in Tonga. Children---even the youngest
baby present---were dressed more colorfully in elaborate gowns or party dresses
as if for a formal occasion such as a wedding.

The members of the choir sit in the rows of pews in the middle of the church. In Falevai, the choir
members wore red scarves around their necks, but I didn’t see this in Neiafu.
The choir’s part in the service is carefully orchestrated and led by a choir
leader with a tuning pipe. Tongans seem to have perfect pitch and the strength
of their voices resonates loudly within the church and beyond. The church on
Falevai was very austere but had amazing acoustics, rendering the choir
awe-inspiring and the sermon intimidating.

Another interesting aspect of the Wesleyan service is that
in both local Tongan churches I attended (Neiafu and Falevai), there was a
church elder whose role in the service consisted of a “call and response” type
affirmation of the minister. As the minister was going through the Bible readings
for the day, this church elder would periodically call out, “’Io!” (Yes!) or “Malo!” (Thank you!) I
noticed only one member in each church had this role. In addition to the minister, one member of each church also performed a separate reading. I like how
the congregation was included in the service.

There were some differences between the large church I
attended on Neaifu and the small congregation at Falevai. In Falevai, all the
children sat in the pews on the right side of the church with respectful
behavior, while at Neiafu, children wandering in and out of the service and
changing pews to sit with someone else during the service were tolerated, as
long as they remained quiet. Men and women’s seating was strictly segregated in
Falevai (I supposed so people could focus on holy thoughts…), while in Neaifu,
it seemed okay to break the strict segregation of genders when late-comers
needed a place to sit.

At the end of the service in the small village of Falevai,
Patrick and I were welcomed as visitors by the choir leader and were asked to
introduce ourselves to the congregation.

After mass, the choir leader came up to talk to us. By the
time he was finished, another activity (perhaps Sunday school?) was in session
in the church. Some of the members of the congregation had left, while
others---including the woman we had brought the pictures for---remained behind.
I didn’t know if it would be rude to interrupt the current activity to hand our
friend the envelope containing the pictures, so I asked the choir leader about
that. He said, “I will give them to her.” As I left the church, I saw the choir
leader rifling through the contents of the envelope I had prepared with the
photographs and then handing the woman only some partial contents. That left me
with a distasteful feeling. I regretted not simply handing the woman the envelope myself.

As we walked back through the village, we met a very
friendly Tongan woman we had seen in church. She was the person who told us
their church was a Wesleyan branch. She also explained to us the contents of
that day’s sermon, since she knew we couldn’t understand it. The gist of it was
that people should renounce material goods and the ways of merchants and focus
on spiritual life with Jesus. On one hand, I could interpret this message being delivered to a very poor congregation as a way of making peace with the way things are; on the other hand, I have to wonder if it keeps people from striving for a higher standard of living?

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Photo Credits

All photos on this blog were taken by either Patrick Dayshaw or Kirsten Rohrbach unless otherwise noted. Please contact us for permission and the appropriate photo credit before using our photos in a public forum.